As so often happens after I write a long post in which I try to figure out how to reconcile where I am with where I used to be (like the one I posted today “Cutting through the Noise…“), I re-think and re-visit and try to revise. In my head, I come up with the bullet-pointed list, the short version, the talking points that seemed so elusive and tangled. Where I often struggle is in trying to convey that I’m loving life and wouldn’t mind more. What I struggle to convey is that when it comes to the type of relationship I seek, I can want the type of connection I once felt with someone else without necessarily wanting the someone else – especially having spent the past few years re-building that type of a connection as a an internal process and solo endeavor.
Moving out to SF has been liberating. I suspect it’s only going to get better. In many respects, this is the life I envisioned when I got engaged, and I’m glad that I’ve taken the chance to seek it out on my own. On some days, I feel a strange sense of smug satisfaction in the “living well is the best revenge” sort of way. While I don’t want to devalue the steps along the way, sometimes, I wish I had made the move out here five years ago when I first started applying for jobs here and in North Carolina and a few other places. I think it would have sped up the process of rediscovering where I had been heading or where I wanted to go. I wasn’t that bold then.
I suspect I wouldn’t have gotten similar experiences, or as many experiences, had I stayed in Philly or Memphis. I do and see so many different things on a weekly basis, that I’m sometimes overwhelmed… and that’s when I feel the need for a sense of counterbalance. That’s when I feel the need for the familiar – which, right now, is my bar friends or a night in chilling to music or reading.
In the past week alone, I’ve gone on two hikes, gone to the beach (the ocean one), gone to the beach (the Bay one) several times, seen fireworks, walked through Golden Gate Park (on the way to a beach), went to the pride parade, and hung out with different people at my local bar two or three different nights. Tomorrow, I might go to a Jazz street festival, next week I’m eyeing up a blues show. When I land a job and feel less financially constrained (I had interviews at two different places last week as well), I’ll start exploring more restaurants and cultural events. I’ve also done some form of creative writing four out of the last seven days, finished reading two books of poetry, and gone for two or three runs. And what I think I was trying to get at in that earlier post is that all of these things are great – like life affirmingly, amazingly great… but I’m also looking for different depths, shared enthusiasm, and for additional people who can introduce me to even more things. I have to remind myself that it’s only been seven months.
Hiking
I have a friend who is a volunteer rover on Mt. Tam. He basically hikes and directs people who seem lost and picks up trash when he sees it and takes pictures of trail issues when he sees them. Mt. Tam, in addition to being a mountain (2,571 feet), is a massive wilderness area with over 200 miles of hiking trails located just outside of the city across the Golden Gate Bridge. It has great views of the city and the fog and the Bay and Mt. Diablo off in the distance. It has sweeping hills covered in tall golden grasses and within it’s footprint is the famed Muir Woods with towering redwoods. At times, the tall pine trees on the hillsides frame the vistas making it feel like an alpine mountainside.
Every time I’ve gone to Mt. Tam, which has probably been six or seven times now, the light has been different, the flora has been different, and the experience has been different. With such easy access (it’s about a 30 minute drive) and a friend who knows the way, I’ve done more hiking in the seven months that I’ve been here than I did in the entire three years I lived in the mountains/hills of central Pennsylvania. After our hikes, my friend and I usually stop for a bite to eat and a beer – often in the quaint town of Mill Valley. On today’s hike, as an extra bonus, we talked with one of the inn keepers who, as you would guess, helps manage an inn on the mountain. He was a jovial character who offered us lemonade and told lots of stories and because he knows two of the people I was hiking with (they’re members at the inn), he gave us a loaf of bread that he had baked earlier in the day… he bakes lots of bread at the inn.
Pride, Diversity, Immersion
While a lot of my experiences are of the “talking with strangers at a bar” or “meeting interesting people through some of my new friends” variety, I also have a lot of solo immersion experiences: going to neighborhood block parties, soaking up the sun at a beach or outside pub, and going to big public events (art shows and walks, protests and parades).
Last Sunday, I went to the pride parade… arguably the largest and most notable pride parade in the country if not the world. Some years it’s hosted over 200,000 people. It was an experience. SF has a long history of being at the forefront of LGBTQ rights. In SF, they organized the first march for gay rights, designed the rainbow flag, and were at the epicenter of the same-sex marriage debates (for a short timeline of some of these events visit here). I consider myself to be a strong supporter of LGBTQ rights. I think it’s ridiculous and embarrassing that there’s even a question about equal rights.
One of the things that drew me to SF was how accepting it is and has been for people who feel marginalized by society. I value acceptance. This is a place where people feel free to let their freak flag fly – a phrase that originates from the counter-culture movement and is often attributed to Jimi Hendrix’s song “If 6 was 9”:
White-collared conservatives
Flashing down the street
Pointing their plastic finger at me
They’re hoping soon, my kind will drop and die
But I’m going to wave
My freak flag high, high ow!.
As such, Pride is inclusive and celebratory. You’ll see every type of freak flag flying. Marching in Sunday’s parade were some of the first gay couples to be legally married in the US. Seeing that, I couldn’t help but to feel genuinely happy for them. Also participating were corporations (Apple, Amazon, etc.), city/government/civic groups (police, fire, politicians, libraries, schools), and ethnic groups (Latino, Chinese, Native American). For me, seeing such diversity was a good reminder that there are LGBTQ people in every profession and every community. Also in the parade were lots of people who live/practice what many conservatives consider to be deviant lifestyles: furrys, nudists, people in drag, people who are trans, people undergoing gender re-affirming care, people of all walks of life (except for maybe the pearl clutching conservatives). It’s amazing to see so many people feeling comfortable in their own skin (even those who were quite literally in their own skin and nothing else). There were a few 18 and older sections of the street fair: one for cannabis and one for kink – I skipped those, but spent the entire day taking everything else in.
The reconciliation between past lives and present lives that I was writing about is less about trying to square the two up or make comparisons and is more about this strange sense of rediscovery rimmed with the traces of what could have been and the bright light linings of what’s still possible. I feel like I’m getting the do-over I wanted five years ago – the new start I had been seeking. I’m wiser now, maybe even better equipped or more gracious. It feels good.